Saudi Arabia: Woman Sentenced For Driving A Car

CAIRO — A Saudi woman was sentenced Tuesday to be lashed 10 times with a whip for defying the kingdom's prohibition on female drivers, the first time a legal punishment has been handed down for a violation of the longtime ban in the ultraconservative Muslim nation.

Normally, police just stop female drivers, question them and let them go after they sign a pledge not to drive again. But dozens of women have continued to take to the roads since June in a campaign to break the taboo.

Making Tuesday's sentence all the more upsetting to activists is that it came just two days after King Abdullah promised to protect women's rights and decreed that women would be allowed to participate in municipal elections in 2015. Abdullah also promised to appoint women to a currently all-male advisory body known as the Shura Council.


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CarCrazedinCali - 9/28/2011 1:10:55 PM

+1 Boost

odd timing...

Brembo - 9/28/2011 1:18:58 PM

+3 Boost

FU Saudi Dude! So wrong.

topneuro - 9/28/2011 2:15:11 PM

+1 Boost

It gets better ...
Saudi clerics: If you allow women to drive we would be very angry.
Saudi hardline religious establishments celebrated the sentence, most Saudi scholars and religious clerics have deemed women driving haram (forbidden). They claim that when a woman drives:
1. it involves uncovering the face which is considered obligatory for women to cover in Saudi.
2. it may lead women to go out of the house more often.
3. it may lead women to have interaction with non-mahram males, for example at traffic accidents.
4. women driving cars may lead to overcrowding the streets and many young men may be deprived of the opportunity to drive.
5. driving would be the first step in an erosion of traditional values, such as gender segregation.

supercarguy - 9/28/2011 8:05:47 PM

+1 Boost

^^^so true, so true.

truckman - 9/29/2011 12:19:06 AM

+2 Boost

Good thing that these ultra conservatives are not a majority here, or would that be racist?